Over the last couple of years online/downloadable video training has really taken off, with a large number of sites launched to host online training (including several as "white box" services for rebranding) -- and even more organisations launching "training schools", often on top of one of the "white box" services.
Having watched quite a bit of online training now, several anti-patterns have emerged, which I wish would disappear from online training. This blog post lists some of the more frustrating ones. Unfortunately most of the training I have directly or indirectly (eg, via a bundle) purchased suffers from at least one of these problems -- some of it suffers from multiple problems.
Dividing training into tiny sections: each training video is just a couple of minutes long, so the user is spending more time clicking "go to next section" and "play" than they are actually learning. It is not obvious to me why this happens, other than that the provider can probably just record single takes and not bother editing them except to top'n'tail them. Ironically this seems (to me anyway) to happen most often with training providers that teach video editing (amongst other things); surely they know how to join two pieces of video together!
One might argue it's usful to be able to jump directly to a particular topic, and that's true -- but the "DVD scenes" user interface for that is vastly preferable to having to hit play over and over on dozens of small sections. On a DVD there is a "mainline" experience which just requires hitting play and then sitting back and watching an extended session that is tens of minutes, if not hours, long; but you can still go directly to a specific scene.
Adding irritating "muzak" to the start/end of each section: you might think of it as "branding", but particularly if you have dozens of tiny videos the user is rapidly going to get tired of hearing that muzak.
Leaving music playing under the whole video: the music is simply distracting from the point of the training video; making it quieter does not stop it being distracting. This is particularly an anti-pattern if the "music" is the same short section of "muzak" that you use as an intro/outro that you leave playing continuously in a loop. (Yes the latter really happened; even a pleasant jingle will become annoying after the hundredth time around the loop... and for the training course motivating this lesson the muzak was annoying even in the first intro :-( )
Poor audio quality: If your audio is constantly clipping then it is almost impossible to listen to. If your audio is very "wet" (lots of echo/reverb) or has a lot of background noise, it will be difficult to understand. If the audio keeps cutting in and out (eg, recorded over a network video chat session) it will be annoying to listen to.
Good clean audio is vastly preferable. It is not always trivial produce, but definitely desired. In an indoor environment, particularly with a "screencast" style of display, it should be relatively easy given a good microphone setup. For outdoor teaching extra care is required (eg, choose a non-windy day!) and/or "looping" or subtitles may be required over particular sections.
Online-streaming only: If your content is available only for streaming then the user's ability to watch the content is dramatically limited, to only situations where they have good connectivity. Many opportunities to watch the content are lost, including most "while travelling" options -- planes, trains, buses, and even hotels, typically do not have good enough connectivity to reliably stream video, at an affordable price. Yet travel is a situation where a user may well have time to spend watching training. Plus it is virtually guaranteed that the streaming site will go away at some point, possibly not that far in the future, despite all your promises of "access forever".
Multiple-clicks to play video: It appears most web-based video requires three clicks to get playing when used with, eg, an Apple iPad, airplayed to an Apple TV: the first click to go to the video section, the second to "load video", and the third to actually start the video. These three clicks per video are particularly annoying if the video is only a couple of minutes long. (I think at least one of these clicks is Apple's browser choices to avoid auto-playing video, but the other two are under the training provider's choice -- at least to minimise how often it happens.)
Releasing only in a custom video size: Custom video sizes do not play back easily on common user technology, dramatically limiting the options for the user to experience the content. For instance, resolutions above 1080p will not easily Apple Airplay, or be directly decoded by a Smart TV (eg, for playback off a USB drive). At present the reasonable resolutions for training are probably 720p and 1080p, and choosing any other resolution is a significant anti-pattern.
Releasing only in an uncommon video format: Most modern devices have hardware decode for things like H.264 video and AAC audio, in
mp4containers. The further you get from "commonly recognised" video formats, the harder it will be for the user to experience your content. Embedding your video content into a PDF file, such that it can be played back with only one specific piece of software on one platform is the extreme version of this anti-pattern!Putting a "test" in between each section which must be copmleted before the user can advance to the next section: generally your content is being watched (and paid for) by users who are motivated to learn something about the topic. Treating them like a child who has to "prove that they have learnt the lesson" is insulting. Yes, maybe it does "improve retention", but surely the adult who purchased and is watching your training is better placed to determine which bits they do need to retain and which bits they do not. (The only place where tests seem legitimate is as part of a training course that leads to an industry-recognised certification; most online training does not lead to anything like that.)
A weaker form of this anti-pattern is requiring the user to "mark as complete" each section. Particularly if it is tracked only as a single marker, so that going back to an earlier section "resets" the completion marker. (Surely the main point of lots of little sections is to allow them to be watched in random order; enforcing a "watched up to" counter requires watching in a linear order, or tracking what was watched separately from the website.)
Showing "progress" in terms of sections watched rather than time: Yes it is easier to implement by just counting "watched 5 videos out of 12". But if some of those videos are 1 minute long, and others are 15 minutes long, it potentially gives the user a very poor idea how much more time is needed to finish watching the training. (If you must show "watched N sections out of M", then also show the progress in terms of "watched U:V minutes out of Y:Z minutes".)
Providing training files as an unordered set of videos: If your training vidoes are not completely independent, so that it will make no difference at all what order you watch them in, then delivering them without an explicit order, listed in the filenames, leaves your viewer guessing which ones to watch in what order. For optimal results name the files so that they automatically sort properly (eg, 01, 02, 03, ... 10, 11, 12, ...); do not start out with one digit and then go on two digits once you reach 10, as then the video will be out of order and require user-intervention to play in order.
That is a lot of anti-patterns. So what improves the user experience:
Providing downloadable content, in a common video format (MP4, 720p or 1080p) that will play back on all modern devices. This allows the user to play on their own choice of device, at their own choice of time, and to configure their own playlist.
Or at least providing a "mobile app" that can download a specific course for off-line playback and allow playback (eg, Apple Airplay) to a larger screen. (As well as a web version for computer playback.)
Ability to play large sections of courses, preferably with a "play all" or "play all in this section" option. Well named downloadable content lets the user easily create a playlist to play all the sections they want to see, back to back -- in almost any media player. (Ideally prefixed by 01, 02, 03, ... 10, 11, 12, ..., etc, so the order is clear and immediately sorts correctly.)
Good clean audio that is easy to understand.
No music. Honestly, skip the intro/outro music (silent is good, short intro and no outro is even better). And defintely no music playing constantly in the background (if you need music playing constantly while you are recording, play it to yourself in headphones; do not put it on your training track).
No tests. Honestly.
ETA, 2016-06-18: add anti-pattern about unordered video files.